ReLiving Memories
by Wermo
Summary: Title is meant to be Re Living Memories, with Re in brackets. Amanda finds herself stuck in Kyle's head, reliving his memories. Rated T, and now complete.
1. Chapter 1

Live the moment.

Then live it again, and again, etc.

***

Kyle stood literally beside himself, as he watched himself kiss Amanda good night. He remembered how her lips felt on his, how she'd lightly pressed her length against him, providing him with a hint of future passion, however innocent. He sighed heavily when they separated and the door closed behind her.

The scene changed for the twelfth time, and he eagerly watched him and Amanda slowly walking to her front door, quietly but intensely staring into each other's eyes. The hint of a smile played on Amanda's lips, he only now discovered. She'd planned the whole kiss.

He heard himself say as he held her delicate hands, "Good night, Amanda."

She'd never said good night, but instead rose onto her toes and pulled him closer for a soft, languorous kiss. Fresh butterflies were busily flying in his stomach even now, making his knees go weak. The memory of her tongue dancing within his mouth made his mouth both water and go dry at the same time. He found it funny that the word tongue in French was _langue_ and seemed to describe the kiss so well. Funny might not be the right word, he thought seriously for a moment, but he strangely couldn't be bothered to consult his encyclopaedic knowledge of the English language just now.

When they separated once more, he discovered the memory was simply too short; he felt he wanted more. As the scene changed again and again, his eyes finally started to close.

He fell asleep while reliving his memories.

***

Amanda woke up with a smile. She found she really did love Kyle, sweet innocent Kyle. With Jessi out of the way and Kyle having chosen her exclusively over her rival, she couldn't be happier. It was still quite early on a bright Sunday morning, and although she'd have to leave him to go to Church at eleven, she knew she had time to pay him a quick visit via his window. She quickly got ready and was out the door in no more than twelve minutes, a bounce in her step, and love in her heart.

She was going to start the day with a big I love you kiss. As she breathed in the cool autumn air, she felt absolutely vibrant. It was a gorgeous day!

***

Kyle opened his eyes with a start, his mind and body reeling with almost foreign emotions. They were very strong, and seemed to instil a hunger that was in his mind, and his heart was beating much faster than normal. He got up from the cool ceramic tub he slept in – it reminded him of the artificial womb he'd lived in for over 16 years – and found his clothes and sheets were all wet with sweat.

He checked himself for a fever and found none. While examining his knowledge of sweating, he became acutely aware that Amanda was quickly approaching from next door, and he no longer had any clothes on! As a gentleman, he hurried around the room, and swiftly covered himself with a bathrobe.

She knocked on his window ever so lightly, knowing he'd hear her. She didn't know all his secrets, but knew without a doubt that he was unusual, and could do things that others couldn't, like when he'd levitated at the prom, or made lights blink on and off, also at the prom.

He pushed the thoughts of the prom away since they carried negative memories as well. There certainly was no need to experience Amanda's kidnapping more than the one time. He tied his bathrobe at the front in a large bow, and came to his window to meet her.

When he came into her view, he noticed her eyes open wide, and her cheeks blush slightly. As he opened the window, he asked, feeling oddly bold, "I'm not dressed yet but come in anyway." Because she trusted him completely, she agreed and let him guide her into the room.

It was true that she'd once taken off most of her clothes in his presence, but he'd been squarely looking away from her at the time so he could only imagine what she looked like without…

He swallowed as the welcome and unwelcome thoughts invaded him, making his palms sweaty.

She looked around the room, noting the pile of soaked sheets and clothing before she turned back to him. "Are you sick?" She'd never seen him sweat much at all, but neither had he ever been sick around her.

He shook his head, and grabbed her hands. Without thinking, his room vanished from view, to be replaced by the memory of last night's kiss. She gasped suddenly, having never experienced such a rapid change of surroundings, when things went from solid, to liquid, then back to solid but in an entirely different – and unexpected – configuration.

She was breathless from the shock; she'd never suspected she would ever be inside his head. It was oddly comforting to him though. He tried to reassure her, "Amanda, I'm sorry." The scene started to play out at regular pace, and she turned toward their memory-selves.

"Am I dreaming?" she muttered, lightly pinching her arm.

"No, we're in my memory, watching last night's kiss." He wanted to tell her so much, but dreaded telling her too much. He knew there were parts of his past that might quarrel with her faith, and didn't want to disclose those to her. For example, although Adam, his genetic father, had never said it outright, he strongly suspected he was closer to a clone than a naturally conceived baby.

Despite her first hand experiences with some of the things he could do, she still asked, "You can do that?" He expected her to smile, to see the possibilities at once, but was concerned by the immediate frown.

Normally he had no trouble talking with Amanda, but as their counterparts kissed – he tried hard to ignore the thought of tongues – he found his attention divided, and the hunger returning. He resisted it, instead chose to answer her. "I don't do it often, and never without conscious thought – until now, I guess." Strangely he could think of little to add, but the feel of her hands in his made his senses perk up. Yes, senses, he thought as he tried in vain to grind his teeth.

She seemed to notice his struggle, and smiled. "Any particular reason we're watching this memory then?" Her eyes went to his lips for a moment when she realized his struggle wasn't going so well.

"We can change it, um, I mean I can." She stopped his stammering with a sudden kiss.

It was nothing like the one last night, because she'd kept her mouth closed, but his senses exploded nonetheless. He said, "Wow."

"We're still in your room, right," she asked. She had a definite twinkle in her eye. He nodded. "Did I kiss you in your room too or just here?"

How come he'd never thought of that! "I'm not sure, let me check. He winked out for less than a second before returning. He didn't find it odd that she was standing a few feet from where she'd been when he'd left. "No, you only kissed me here. We're holding hands in my room though."

The twinkle returned, more noticeable than before. She came up to him, with an impish smile. "Why don't you have morning breath?"

He couldn't find an answer, not having ever really analysed his presence in his memories. He guessed, "Because an image of ourselves, of our brains, are here and not our bodies."

"But why can I touch you then," she asked, before hugging him.

He buried his head into her hair, and took a deep breath, but found he couldn't smell her. In fact, her hair normally tickled his nose and that was barely registering, but register it did. "I can't explain it, Amanda, um…"

"Yes Kyle," she said, pulling away.

"Do you want to go back to my room?" He wanted her to stay, but would listen to her if she wanted to leave.

"How long have we been here? My watch isn't moving."

"Well, that's not really your watch but –"

"And you're not really wearing a bathrobe," she playfully teased as she lightly tugged at the bow. It didn't fall away as much as it disappeared. She immediately turned away, turning bright red. He saw her glance at her watch, and noticed it was no longer there. Her clothes weren't faring much better either. Whole swaths of fabric shimmered and became semi-transparent. When they finally vanished altogether, she covered herself with her arms and almost shouted over her shoulder, "Take us out Kyle!"

His eyes lingered on her backside, but he acknowledged her request almost immediately.

He vanished, leaving a naked Amanda in his head.

Returning seconds later, he found her panicking. Tears streaked her face, her hair was a mess, and she no longer covered herself; instead she clutched him fiercely. "Why did you leave me alone for so long," she screamed.

He suddenly seemed unsure, "I only left for three and a half seconds."

"It felt like an hour to me!" She sobbed in relief, whispering into his ear, "Take me back."

Nodding, he held her hands tightly, and vanished again.

When he returned, he knew very well she'd be panicked, because he'd been gone for nearly five minutes. Sensing he needed help to get Amanda out of his memories, he'd called Jessi on her cell, and left her a note on her bedroom door. He'd even sent a text message to Foss in case they were training. He found Amanda sitting on the front steps of her house.

"Thanks for coming," she muttered under her breath. She sounded oddly calm. "You can't get me out can you?" He'd not actively considered the time difference between reality and his memories, but when she said, "You know, I think I was even aroused watching this, oh, two days ago!"

If three and a half seconds were an hour, five minutes was over three days, or specifically 85.71 hours. He dreaded the very real possibility of having to wait hours for Jessi to come to their rescue. He didn't want to tell Amanda it could realistically be days, weeks or even months.

And then what? He refused to explore what would happen if her body needed food or rest. He'd wait a week first, and give Jessi time to come and try her ideas.

But first things first, he willed Amanda to wear the red dress he loved so much. It didn't quite seem to fit right, but she seemed relieved. "I wasn't uncomfortable, but thanks." No smile came to her lips.


	2. Chapter 2

He'd seen Amanda angry before, especially when she'd thought he was cheating on her with Jessi – she'd found them kissing in his room, in an innocent attempt at exchanging electricity through his lips into Jessi – but he had never seen her so disengaged from him as she was now. It was also true that when she'd broken up with him, he and Jessi had gotten a lot closer and kissed – a lot. He bit his lip at the thought.

She walked up to him, her gaze at his feet, "Your memories are detailed."

As their counterparts separated from their kiss one more time, and the door closed behind Amanda, she looked up into his eyes. "I was able to walk down the street to just around the corner before coming back here. I could even go into your tub to sleep, but I was never tired so I couldn't." Tears appeared in her eyes, and her voice turned shrill, "Eating the fruit on the kitchen table tastes the same as the grass we're standing on!"

"You're hungry?" he asked. Despair started to sink in; if she were hungry, he'd have to attempt more drastic measures to get her out; there really wasn't anything they could eat here.

"No, I'm not." Her gaze returned to his feet. "But it's hard to sit and do nothing but watch a kiss thousands of times."

There was something he could do about that. "Ok, here, I'll change the memory to the first day we met." He blinked his eyes and vanished.

He reappeared almost immediately. He grabbed her hands and closed his eyes, vanishing again.

When he reappeared he was frantic. Never had he ever had problems with any of his abilities to this degree. Sure he'd had a hard time when he was learning to control his hearing, but some abilities seemed to never go wrong – until now. He wondered if it was because her brain wasn't as developed as his. He shuddered at the thought.

She sounded more defeated than he was, "Let's go to your room at least." She let go of his hands and started walking, leaving him behind. "That was quick at least. You never left for more than a second or two."

As they went to his room, he found some areas a little fuzzy or blurry. He pointed out one spot to Amanda. She briefly glanced at it before replying, "The fuzzies. They're where your memory isn't perfect. Your parents' room is almost completely fuzzy. If you try to go in there or if you touch a fuzzy, you reappear outside where we kiss." She seemed to grow very quiet as she walked the rest of the way to his room.

It was disconcerting to him that he couldn't hear her heart beat or sense her temperature. He never realized how he had come to take those things for granted.

He felt so powerless! He growled and balled his fists. She climbed into his tub, readjusting her dress, seemingly ignoring him. His mind was in a frenzy of thought, of speculation, of wild and crazy imaginings that she wasn't even in his head and that he was dreaming all this. Remembering she'd pinched her arm to see if she was dreaming, he did so as well, but did it really hard. Pain did register but he was quite sure that it should have hurt a lot more than it did. He slapped his arm forcefully, making her jump. She turned to look at him, "Doesn't hurt much, does it?"

He wasn't paying as much attention to her as he normally did. He did hear her though and he murmured, "I thought I might be dreaming."

"That's fresh, Kyle!" she yelled. "Do I normally yell hysterically in your dreams? Am I usually naked for days at a time?" She stood in his tub. She opened her mouth for a second but closed it resolutely.

He turned to her, a sheepish look on his face. "No." Not for days – the occasional stray thought yes, but days no – he kept to himself.

She tripped on the lip of his tub, and fell head first onto the floor. He came running when he saw her neck bend unnaturally. Her eyes glared at him as she accepted his assistance. What could easily have hurt her seriously in reality had done next to nothing here in his memory. She continued, "I never had an _out of body _experience before and I pray I never do again." When she was standing he carefully checked her neck but she brushed him off angrily. "It barely hurt." When he didn't immediately stop, she yelled and pushed him, "Get off me!"

He took a step back, and stared at his lovely Amanda. A thousand apologies were ready on his lips, but he had a hard time accepting this was Amanda. "Amanda?"

She didn't open her mouth and just glared at him harder.

His Amanda was sweet, loving, caring, and… He consulted what he'd read of her religion. Before he'd gone to her confirmation years ago, he had read the Bible and fifteen other books on Christians in general, while focusing primarily on the main Christian religions like Roman Catholic, Baptist, and so forth. "Forgive me, Amanda."

She slapped him. When his head snapped back toward her, he found she'd softened considerably. "Get me out of here and I'll forgive you," she whispered, tears in her eyes threatening to spill over.

He scratched his head, wondering how to broach the subject. He turned to the side, toward the tub. He didn't know what to do, but knew he wouldn't – couldn't – leave her alone. They'd get through this together, however long it took.

Even if she slapped him repeatedly.

Her arms circled him and she buried her head into his chest, under his chin. "I'm sorry Kyle."

There was one thought that had circled in his head repeatedly, but that he'd chosen to ignore. It seemed to be the best explanation as to why she was stuck in this particular memory, even though he could access seemingly any other. That wasn't completely true was it, he argued with himself. He'd only looked to one other memory, twice. He hugged her back, "It's okay, Amanda, I'll make everything right." She pulled away for just a moment, and looked into his eyes. He saw the hurt, the desperation, and the loneliness. "I have to try something." When she hugged him even harder, shaking her head, he continued, "I'm staying inside my memories so I won't be gone for more than a few minutes." She began to sob. "I promise I won't leave you alone like I did a few minutes ago."

Between sobs, she muttered, "Do it."

Fighting to keep himself together, to stay strong for her, he closed his eyes and vanished.

***

He had to make sure his memories were otherwise intact and that there wasn't anything else seriously wrong. He couldn't leave his memories though because even a quarter of a second spent outside would be five minutes here.

Going from a random memory to another, he looked for anything out of the ordinary. Because he didn't want to waste time, he sped them up as fast as he could. He did have a few years of memories in his head, all meticulously detailed.

He stopped the playback of the memory he'd been accessing, a dinner he'd had with his family a few days after he'd learned to talk. He reached into the steaming pot of spaghetti sauce and licked his finger, which should have burned. Like Amanda had said, the taste was unlike anything he'd ever experienced. It was like eating flavorless cotton candy, because it melted in his mouth, but unlike cotton candy, didn't remain as a thin sweet mess in your mouth. No, this dissolved to nothing, with absolutely no taste. On a hunch, he bit the large metal spoon on the counter, which had surely been used to stir the sauce as it was cooking. Somehow not surprisingly he bit through it, and it slowly dissolved in his mouth but refused to be chewed. It was a strange sensation, and a peculiar sight to see a metal utensil with clear bite marks through it.

He turned toward the table, looking at his family. If they woke and saw the notes and more importantly saw Amanda standing absolutely still in his room, what would they do? It wouldn't be that long before Nicole would come down to the kitchen and start making their traditional Sunday breakfast of blueberry pancakes. Remembering the time it had been when he woke, he determined he had – oh, it would likely be about 45 minutes, which would become a month. That's of course if no one saw or read the sign on Jessi's door, which was a small possibility.

Great, a month, nearly 32 days. Even in his presence, she'd likely go mad. He turned back to the metal spoon and saw it had repaired itself, which meant his memories had a memory of their own. They would be resistant to tampering, which was good.

But then he wondered as a small thought had popped up, so obvious he'd never contemplated it. Couldn't he simply slow down the memory she was in, so they wouldn't have to wait weeks or months before Jessi came to help?

It was worth a try.


	3. Chapter 3

She was still in his tub when he reappeared, which comforted him, but she didn't turn because his reappearance had been completely quiet. He watched her without a sound, and found himself wondering again how she was feeling emotionally. Her beauty always captivated him, but he longed to smell her, to hear her heartbeat, to have her really smile.

When he'd left her for those five minutes, the five minutes that translated to practically three and a half days, he could only fathom how alone she'd felt, how abandoned. It really was no wonder to him that she would become so distant so quickly because time was working against him.

Realizing that every second he spent watching her could in fact be contributing to her ongoing emotional distance, he whispered her name.

She didn't answer but merely tapped at the space in front of her in the tub. His lips pulled into a half smile. "You're wallowing," he asked as he stepped into place and sat. The tub was there surrounding him but didn't feel cool to the touch as it normally did. The blanket normally at the bottom of the tub had been thrown at the wall behind her. Then he noticed the computer chair wasn't in the same place, and a few other articles on his desk had moved. As dread knotted his stomach, he kept his eyes from hers, only because he couldn't bear to see her hurt. "How long?"

His eyes nonetheless found hers when she looked up. She sighed very heavily, "I don't know anymore." He didn't understand how this could be, how if he'd stayed in his memories and sped them up, and slowed them…

He'd not only slowed them, but stopped them altogether, for what, five or six minutes, more? He normally could consciously track time, but he found the ability hard to grasp while inside his memories. When he tried to count seconds ticking, nothing came to him. That could make sense, since five minutes in his memory translated to three and a half seconds in reality.

Growing frustrated, he cupped her face with his hands, and said to her, "Amanda, I promise you I'll get you out of here."

She rolled her eyes and said, in a soft whisper, "I wonder how old I'll be when you do."

"Time is moving very fast inside my memories, but you don't need to worry about getting old physically."

"What about my memory?" she suddenly shouted. This new side to Amanda frightened him; he didn't have to wait for her to continue. "I can't get into my house to play piano to pass the time! I'm forgetting my music!" She grabbed his wrists and ripped his hands from her face. The fury drained from her as she slumped her shoulders, "Just get me out; I want nothing else."

He knew she practiced a lot but he seriously doubted she could be forgetting her music even in a month, which he felt was the limit to how long she'd have to wait. No, he corrected himself, that was the delay he expected before people would find them stationary in his room. Should hours elapse before Jessi entered his memories, they could be here for an awful long time.

Considering further that Amanda took great comfort in playing her music, the fact she couldn't get into her house would certainly aggravate her to no end. Maybe he could do something about that too while they waited. What if he brought other memories into this one, attaching them like a panoramic photo? He might even be able to lengthen the memory to encompass an entire day, or a week, or month. That way she'd most certainly be able to go to many places, including her piano.

But first, he had to try to adjust the playback speed of this memory. He first slowed it down, and soon noticed Amanda whiz and whip by at a fantastic pace. He saw her stare at him for fractions of seconds, knowing that they were quite possibly minutes, as well as leave and return every now and then. He even thought he felt her kiss him a few times, but it had happened so fast that he couldn't be sure it had even happened.

Alternatively he sped up the playback of the memory and fully expected to see Amanda standing virtually still in front of him, but she wasn't in the room when he did so. He sighed, realizing that she could be virtually anywhere in the house, or outside, or quite possibly wandering around the block. Besides, what would you do if you had nothing to do, couldn't sleep, or eat, and never got physically tired or get hurt?

A vision of Amanda jumping head first from the top of the roof appeared unannounced, and unwelcome. He shook it away like the terrible nightmare that it was before being briefly assaulted by the slashing of her wrists with one of the sharp knives found in the kitchen. He couldn't believe she'd ever try to take her life as it went against her religion but if she had been completely alone in his memories for a few months, how else could he explain her earlier comments when she'd tripped on the lip of his tub?

Those were questions he didn't particularly want to address so he filed them away.

He got up and started for the door. He crashed into Amanda who'd been walking briskly toward him in the other direction. It was a complete surprise to him to realize she was in a memory that was already going at full speed, and one he couldn't seem to consciously control. The collision produced no pain, only a tangle of limbs and the bumping of heads.

When they disentangled themselves, Amanda stared into his eyes and said, "It was nice to have you in the room, even if you were a statue." For the first time since he'd first brought her into his memories, she smiled at him. It wasn't her true smile, the one she shared with him when she said she loved him, but it was a smile, and that was a start.

It was true he didn't feel like he deserved it, but he much preferred a smile to a slap in the face.

He gave her a half smile, because he was desperate to get her out of his head and back to reality. Seeing her approach slowly, her lips puckering, he began to panic. The change from anger and despair to love was simply too quick for him, despite the time that had elapsed for her. He'd never had trouble kissing Amanda before, but now he told her the first semi-random tidbit he'd never told her. "I don't have a belly button because I was born in an artificial womb."

She stopped, her lips no more than a quarter inch from his. She sighed then kissed him anyway, a quick but strong touch that was also unlike her. "Why did you tell me that?" She withdrew a foot but held his arm. "That's your secret?"

He couldn't look her in the eye. He had so many secrets! "I was born at the age of 16."

"What?" She turned away for the briefest moment, and turned back, her eyes squinting. "That's what you've been hiding from me all this time?"

He wasn't really sure why he was telling her now, or even how much he would tell her. He'd been completely unable to get her out of his head, and he regretted her not knowing sooner but he had to protect her from the people who wanted to harm him. They had kidnapped her once, supposedly never intending any harm, but she didn't know the full story and he didn't completely believe them. He was innocent and by definition naïve about a lot of things, but with the threat of organizations like Latnok and Madacorp he was quickly losing that innocence.

He consulted one of the few expressions he'd learned. There were many he still didn't know. "That's the tip of the iceberg, Amanda." Briefly he contemplated the fact that his father Adam and a fellow scientist, a woman named Grace Kingsley, had used their genetic material to create him in a little dish. The fact he and Jessi looked like Adam and Sarah was no coincidence; they were only steps away from being full blown clones.

He also worried that he'd destroyed numerous clones that had been started in a warehouse in Seattle, but that she'd either consider it murder or consider him something inhuman if she ever learned he was nearly a clone himself. He knew well his reasons for preventing more people just like him from being created. It wasn't so much they would all be like him, because he felt he was a good person, but the people behind them, using them, turning them into tools, into weapons. Those people he could not trust.

Where could he start, and should he? He took her hand – it was really nice that he could again without fear of her anger – and said, "Let's sit in the tub, I'll tell you some of my secrets, those that relate to our problem here anyway."

"Ok," she said, stretching it out over seconds.

When they sat down, he took both her hands and looked into her eyes. "I'm hoping Jessi can help get you out of my head." He was quite often blunt and to the point, but he didn't want to bludgeon her either with _I'm a science experiment_. Besides, he was human; that came first – or should, he thought derisively.

She'd clearly noticed that Jessi was different as well, because she never hesitated in her response. "She was born the same way." When he nodded, she added, "Are there many more like you?"

"Not that I know of, but I can't completely rule it out." It was something he, Jessi, and Foss had contemplated on numerous occasions, and something that was pretty much pointless to think about. They could only tackle it once it came true.

When she didn't reply immediately he continued, "I think a part of me is holding on to you in some way, and I can't seem to control it."

"How often have you brought anyone into your memories?" She sounded very subdued; it was likely a topic she'd thought about at great lengths since she'd been here.

"I've only brought Jessi into my memories, less than a handful of times." He paused, recollecting himself after nearly telling Amanda that Jessi had brought him into her memories more often.

She closed her eyes. "I'm the first normal person brought here, and you didn't do it consciously."

The statement struck him hard. He'd never previously been tempted to revisit his memories of Amanda, but last night after that kiss he'd felt practically compelled to do so. And when he'd fallen asleep revisiting his memory of that kiss, the damage had probably already been done.

His jaw slackened as he envisioned ever worse scenarios of bringing everyone he held dear into this memory, and being unable to relinquish his hold over them, however involuntary it was. They would live literally decades in only a few days real time. What if he didn't have to have people touch him to bring them into his memory? He could see it clearly: an ever widening swath of overgrown Seattle suburb, surrounded by larger and larger circles of fencing as a _dead zone_ was identified by the stumped scientific community, a zone that would grow larger with time. No human being would be able to enter the zone without getting sucked in; they would collapse, seemingly dead.

The fact their bodies weren't actually dead wouldn't matter. He shuddered at the thought and resolved to do something, anything, to prevent that from happening, even his death.

His wandering mind must have been apparent because Amanda shook him out of the dreadful reverie. "Kyle? What's wrong?"

"Sorry." He might have sighed had he been in reality. "I'm going to get you into your house so you can play piano."

She brightened considerably at his words. "I tried sneaking in beside myself into the house but the fuzzies bring me right back outside the second I take a step inside my house."

They stood and they walked hand in hand through the house, on their way to the now infamous kiss.

Normally his memory was exact, precise to a fault. Why were there _fuzzies_ as Amanda called them? Was it a measure of degradation of his memory from replaying it countless times? Or was it because only a portion of him controlled this memory, a portion that did not have his capacity?

When he'd checked the other memories he hadn't seen a single fuzzy. In his room he saw three obvious ones, but also noticed five much smaller ones, about half an inch wide. Were they growing, multiplying?

More importantly, should he try and touch one?


	4. Chapter 4

He closed the front door with the beginnings of terror in his heart. There had been three new fuzzies in the main hallway, two in the living room, and one in the kitchen. It was particularly troubling that he had not even tried to look for them and still discovered them.

Amanda didn't seem to notice him slowing the pace. She merely avoided their memory selves and walked up the steps to her house when she stopped and looked back at him. She immediately frowned, "What's wrong?"

He wondered briefly whether he should lie but thought better of it. Aside from being a generally terrible liar, his concerns made the truth much easier to say, or at least a portion of it. He looked around but thankfully didn't see any out here. "The fuzzies worry me," he said, biting his lip.

As their memory selves slid by Amanda, she laughed out loud. She opened her mouth to say something but as she looked at him, stopped. She took a few steps toward him, "Why?"

Instead of answering her, he asked her another question, "When did you last touch a fuzzy?"

"Weeks ago," she said and paused, "when you were still a statue in your room."

Her eyes seemed to tell him to probe further. "Did you do it intentionally?"

She smiled and playfully rolled her eyes. "No. I was walking out here, looking into people's houses, trying to look through curtains and such." When she looked into his eyes, she said, "What? There's nothing else to do." There was no fire in her voice though. "You weren't responding to my kisses so after a few days I assumed you'd be gone a while so I just kept busy."

One word brought his spirits up. "Kisses?"

Her spirits seemed to go down as she nodded. "I don't feel much of anything physically, pain for example, but kissing you still feels nice."

Despite finding it a little odd that she would feel the need to kiss him when he had tried to slow the memory to a crawl – especially after her anger and her despair – he was nonetheless further confused by the dampening of her mood.

She clearly saw it in his eyes. "When you have nothing to do but wait, you think. When you're tired of thinking, you do stuff. Everything and anything, well, almost." The way she'd said the last few words, he'd expected her to blush. "I spent days staring at you, waiting for you. When days turned to weeks and months I explored."

He figured that if he'd been outside of his memories, he would have had to swallow. He still raised his eyebrows at her comment. "Explore?" He may be innocent but he'd overheard plenty of inappropriate conversations even in school. Besides, he didn't want to tell her he'd watched her throughout the whole time. It was unfortunate though that he'd never realized that the seconds she'd sat staring at him had felt like days to her. He'd certainly never seen or felt her do anything inappropriate or even risqué.

His brow furrowed again as he pondered whether time in this memory was still increasing in velocity. It might explain the fuzzies' existence, and provide a hint as to their proliferation.

She laughed again, softer this time, and walked toward him. She held his hands, and gazed into his eyes. "I did things I haven't done since I was a little girl: jumped on the couch, squealed and yelled. I would have loved to have a pillow fight but the bedrooms are full of fuzzies so I couldn't get any." She hesitated, "When we go back inside, would you mind if we have a pillow fight with the sofa cushions?"

She was practically dripping sweetness – his fears vanished and he could only think of doing as she asked. He said with a big grin, "Sure, but you'll have to teach me."

She wasn't surprised he'd never had a pillow fight, not anymore anyway. There was a glint in her eye, mischief was brewing. He was saddened that all she could do was think, but also intrigued to find out what she had thought of.

She turned and pulled him along toward the steps of her house. Standing on the first step, she turned again and kissed him. The all-too-short kiss between their memory selves started and ended while they kissed. Although he still felt it was undeserved, he did nothing to stop it. His extremities tingled and he found that he definitely felt the pleasurable sensations from their kiss.

All too well; all other thoughts dispersed under the onslaught.

She pressed herself against him just a little more forcefully than she ever had before then withdrew. He took a deep breath, hoping to smell her, but could detect nothing at all. He started to frown when she put her hand on his lips. She chuckled very lightly, seductively even. Perhaps it was still an innocent form of seduction, but he was definitely attuned to her at present. She said softly, as though someone might overhear, "It's one of the few things I can feel too."

"It doesn't make sense," he began to say.

"It does." He scoffed then apologized when he realized she was completely serious. He found it fascinating that despite his knowledge and his superior brain, there were still so many things he didn't know. "The brain is the body's largest sex organ." When his jaw slackened and his eyes grew wide, she playfully tapped him on the arm. "That doesn't mean I'm going to run around naked with you for days." She smiled briefly but her gaze fell for just a moment before returning swiftly. With likely more spunk than she actually felt, she said, "I was naked long enough."

Not knowing what to say, he pulled her toward the front door of her house. As the memory version of Amanda opened the door, he could see fuzzies everywhere beyond. The door closed promptly, making him lose this chance. Of course, he didn't have to wait more than 95 seconds before his next opportunity would come.

He turned to her, biting the corner of his lip. "When you touch a fuzzy, you disappear."

"Yes, and reappear just outside your door." She pointed to the exact spot.

He was deep in thought when Amanda tapped him on the shoulder, "Are you okay?" She seemed worried, probably even more so than he was that he didn't know what to do. They were in his head after all; shouldn't he know everything going on in here? He sighed and squeezed by memory Amanda into her house, but try as he might, the fuzzies dissolved around him as he walked. He reached the piano, where he played a few notes, hoping that Amanda would hear and come in, but then he suddenly realized that the door was closed, and that the memory had probably already restarted.

He wasn't inside the house for more than thirty three seconds, but he hoped desperately that she hadn't been alone for too long.

Willing himself to return to the looping memory, he appeared instantly in the spot she had pointed out. He looked around, and saw Amanda looking intently at her front door. As memory Amanda opened the door, she threw herself in after him. He jumped back as she appeared exactly where he had been. Whatever might have happened if they occupied the same space was thankfully averted. The pit of his stomach knotted, though he knew it was really his brain's stress response than his physical stomach.

She saw him and gave him a fierce hug. "I thought I'd lost you," she said through fresh tears. He hugged her back as strongly.

Dreading the answer to the question, he nonetheless asked it, "How long was I gone?"

"Half a day, I'm really not sure." The dread that had settled in him dispersed a little at her answer. It seemed as though the memory he'd been in was certainly slower than this one but nowhere near as slow as reality. Wait, that wasn't right at all. Thirty three seconds in reality would feel like – he did the math instantly – nearly nine and a half hours. And if the memory were speeding up even faster, then twelve hours was certainly reasonable.

He didn't let go but withdrew to face her. "What did you see when I went inside?"

She shook her head and said, "I just saw you touch the fuzzies and disappear. When you didn't reappear here," she released one arm to point at their feet, I ran after you the next time the door was open."

"You didn't try that for twelve hours did you?"

Her mouth was open slightly, as though she were out of breath. She shook her head, "No, only the first hour, then I looked everywhere else for you, even climbing on top of your house to get a better view." He could scarcely believe she'd climbed his house; it wasn't particularly difficult with the front porch and the good hand holds, but he would never have imagined it. Because he was speechless, she continued, a little twinkle in her eye. "There's no risk to getting hurt here so I've done a few things I would never normally do."

Having found his voice, he scoffed, "Like what?"

"Like scaling houses!" she shouted. "Balancing on a fence, like a tightrope walker," she said more softly.

"And kissing statues," he quizzed with a small smile.

Her smile was a lot broader, "Not just kissing." She turned around and started jogging to the street.

"What do you mean by that?" he asked as he chased her. When she noticed he was following, she ran in earnest. She was barefoot, but without pain or the risk of injury, it only made sense. He could run at top speed for well over a mile normally, and normally he'd be able to catch her quickly, but here in his head, in his memory, he couldn't run any faster than she.

That was a mystery in itself. Here he couldn't use his hearing, his sight, even his strength.

It hit him: he was normal.

She ran headlong into the fuzzies and vanished from sight. He stopped and turned, finding her immediately. With a huge grin, she went inside his house. He willed himself to appear at the door but perhaps because he was already in the memory, he didn't go there. He wasn't about to try to touch a fuzzy, knowing the likelihood of that was slim at best, and that time would elapse too much to get the clarification he sought.

He started running toward the house; it certainly was no more than twenty seconds away so he knew she wouldn't miss him. When he thought of time inside the memory, he still had a fairly good grasp of it even if it wasn't exact, so maybe he wasn't completely normal after all.

He nearly bumped into his memory selves but narrowly avoided them as they opened the front door. He hadn't been paying attention where they were. Letting them pass delayed him for only a few seconds, and then he was on his way into the house. The house wasn't that big, especially with the top floor mostly covered in fuzzies. He slowed as he approached his bedroom door, which was oddly closed.

The smile that had been on his face disappeared. His jaw clenched as he opened the door.

"What took you so long?" asked Amanda. There was something missing and he knew exactly what it was.


	5. Chapter 5

"What took you so long?" asked Amanda, with something glaringly missing. "I'm getting cold over here."

She was sitting in his tub, a playful grin on her face. His jaw relaxed but he found himself tremendously nervous, remembering very vividly how angry and embarrassed she'd been when her clothes had vanished the first time. It had happened again.

Although his eyes had momentarily strayed to her chest, he looked away, flustered. He willed a shirt – anything really – to cover her upper half. When he succeeded, she said, "Thanks."

He turned back to her, finding an enormous purple rug-like thing for lack of a better term. It engulfed her entire body, minus her head, and even her limbs were trapped inside. She looked down and wiggled before laughing out loud. "Not exactly what I had in mind, Kyle." With her head she pointed to the wall opposite his computer.

Her red dress was carefully folded in the corner.

His jaw dropped; he was totally speechless. If he was outside of his memory, he'd be blushing from head to toe.

She continued to wriggle. "Kyle, help please?" she asked, batting her eyes at him. When he went over to her he grabbed and pulled at the purple fabric that surrounded her. As they both worked at trying to rip it off, she added, "So, um, how did you come up with this to cover me?"

He tugged hard at the fabric and nearly toppled her. "Not sure." He stood still for a moment and willed her clothes to disappear.

She looked down immediately and gasped a little. "Okay," she said slowly. "Now I'm completely naked under this thing." She looked intensely at him. "You should hurry before I get embarrassed." She stopped wiggling altogether. With her arms and legs stuck inside the purple rug and with only a little hole for her neck, she didn't have a lot of balance. Thankfully the tub was a fairly snug place if a little slippery.

Noticing that no amount of pulling or tugging was going to rip this figment of imagination from her, he yelled. "Scissors!" She laughed out loud as he turned to his desk, opened the drawer where his scissors were, made a fuzzy vanish as he grabbed them –

He knew he'd vanished from her sight. Not one prone to cursing, he strongly resisted the urge to do so and returned immediately to the memory that was out of control. Thankfully he'd only been gone less than five seconds, which still translated to the length of the average movie.

His spirits sank as he hurried back to his room. When he walked in she stared at him hard. "I guess that could have been worse." He walked toward her and started to cut the fabric. She added, "You could have been gone days, or months." The purple fabric fell away, exposing her completely. She didn't squirm or hide herself but her playful attitude had fallen just as readily. He turned to where the dress was when he was interrupted. "The dress disappeared with my underwear." Even though he really had no need to, he swallowed hard.

"Kyle," she said as she put a hand on his shoulder. "I don't know how long I've been here, but it's been a very long time." He opened his mouth to reply, to assuage her fears, but she stopped him. "I can only feel emotions, very few sensations though." She took a deep breath, probably to relax, even though she looked completely relaxed. "I'm tired of thinking; I just want to be with you and feel something." She patted the space beside her and he quietly walked in and sat.

They were pressed together in the tub, she naked and he, well, he should be too. He concentrated for a moment and she sighed. He put his arm around her shoulders and she snuggled her head into his neck. Just as he periodically stole glances at her, she did so of him.

They lay naked for hours, doing next to nothing, just feeling each other's closeness. His extremities were tingling and he could only fathom what she felt because she sighed every now and then. They were happy sighs he felt, and she would kiss his shoulder or his neck once in a while. He would bury his head into her hair, hoping for the familiar scent or for the tickling sensation that her hair normally had on his nose.

They very well might have lain like that for more than a day, but Kyle eventually broke the silence. "Amanda, I think I know why you're stuck here."

She didn't react, but simply brushed his chest with her hand. "I think I know too."

"Oh?"

"It is obvious! I believe you replayed this memory over and over that night and somehow got a brain cramp or something. Then when I came to your window the next morning and held your hands, into your memory we went, and I got stuck in your cramp." When he didn't say anything, she patted his chest and added, "It's okay. I do want to get out eventually, but maybe we should try to soften that cramp somehow."

When he pulled away from her hair she turned to him and gave him a strong kiss. In a replay of his memory their tongues mingled during the kiss. She made a sound with her throat as the kiss deepened. Her free hand went to his shoulder, then to his back, and he had a sneaky suspicion that she'd tried to reach his back side but her arm wasn't long enough.

They explored for many minutes, remaining innocent only because they never tried the obvious. There would probably be days for that. The tingling sensations had been replaced not with an audible hum, but almost like the energy coursing through him was thrumming through his extremities, like fingers tapping on his insides. Utterly giddy and yet relaxed, his focus was solely on her. He could gaze at her for hours, probably even days. He took all his cues from her, and he happily, and very tenderly, reached over and pinched her rear. She giggled, looked up, and gasped with a sharp intake of breath.

He couldn't help but mimic her when his gaze registered what she saw. She'd been the center of his universe for these past hours, however much time had actually passed didn't matter one bit; he couldn't even guess when it had happened.

Fuzzies surrounded them. It looked like they were floating in a tub on a mirror-like sea, covered in perpetual fog. She hugged him tightly and he welcomed it, needing her reassurance as well. He looked all around; there wasn't a hint of movement anywhere.

He would have gladly allowed a shiver of fear to pass through him just then. She pressed her body very hard against his, and she scrunched her eyes closed.

There was no way he'd let them get her, whatever they were.


	6. Chapter 6

As she plastered her body against his, he thought of a number of explanations for their predicament. She'd been in his memory for several months at least, and the anomalies they referred to as fuzzies had never manifested like this. But when they were together, sharing an exquisite moment of tenderness – well hours of it – they came out in full force.

He looked around once more, into the fog that should have been his room, in exact detail. The fog was impenetrable and there was no way he'd leave Amanda alone for even the smallest fraction of a second to explore the fog or disperse it. No, unless he could go with her without fear of her being left behind, he wouldn't leave.

Looking up, he felt that the fog was close enough that he would not even be able to stand in the tub, severely limiting his options. She clung to him more tightly than he'd ever thought possible. It only took a moment's reflection to realize it was possible because this was her brain clinging to him and not her physical muscles. He clung to her as well.

They remained like this for several minutes, but he continuously scanned their surroundings for any changes. It certainly didn't appear to be getting any closer, but the floor was also covered in fog just outside of his tub. The tub seemed to be floating on fog.

"It's eerie," he said, noting he'd never actually used this word until now. Whether Amanda heard she left no indication. It was probably best anyway; here they could very well be in peril and he was thinking about a word he'd never previously used!

He had to get to the task at hand. "Amanda," he said softly, gently shaking her, "we need to talk."

She didn't relinquish her hold but groaned a little. If she were to squeeze him this hard in reality he'd likely have difficulty breathing. "Go ahead."

With a little sigh, he started, "What do you think these fuzzies are anyway?"

"No clue. I've noticed more of them lately, but never, **never**, like this."

"By lately, do you mean a few days ago?"

"No, it's been really gradual: months ago." While he thought, she added, "You don't know what they are either?" Her fear was growing quickly, but so was his.

"I'm not sure. All of my other memories are perfect, without any blurring or these fuzzies." He practically spat the last word. "When I was a statue, I actually slowed time to a near crawl. I thought you were looking at me for seconds."

"And I was staring at you for hours, sometimes days…" she let herself trail off. "You mean – you were watching?" He'd felt her relax her grip for the smallest moment; normally she would have looked him in the eye, but this was anything but normal.

"Of course." It felt nice to tell her the truth.

"You didn't feel me…?" He opened his mouth to ask what she was referring to when she growled, and said. "We've been in your tub naked for probably half a day, groping each other with our eyes!" She wasn't exactly yelling and he could feel her frustration, but there was no way she was letting go of him, for anything. "Did you feel me grab you?"

His eyes opened wide, "When I was a statue?"

"Yeah."

"Where?"

"Use your imagination! I had months and you weren't moving." The fire calmed in her, maybe it was more her nerves. "Started with your butt first."

He couldn't keep a nervous giggle from erupting. "No, didn't feel any of that. I thought I felt you kiss me a couple times though." He paused, "Oh." The tingling sensation returned full force. The briefest kisses he had felt was likely her kissing him for quite a few minutes. "You made out with me _without_ me?" He wasn't at all hurt by that fact – there simply was too much at stake right now – but he couldn't help but poke a tiny bit of fun while they tried to think of a way out.

She turned her head a little, to bring her lips closer to his ear. A stray thought made him wonder how it would feel to have her breath tickle his ear. Instead he listened to the single word she uttered, "Repeatedly."

"Really?" He was shocked.

"Kyle, really, I'm not going to describe what I did or didn't do until we get out of here." She giggled. "Let's just say I was never naked, but not always fully clothed either." When she felt him open his mouth, she warned with a shout, "End of discussion!" She was likely feeling pretty shy for having admitted it.

He looked around again, seeing no apparent change. "We can't fight what we don't know."

She turned her head out to look at the fog before quickly turning her head back. "And you're not leaving without me." He knew it was an order, but one he'd decided on the moment he'd seen the fog all around them.

"I wouldn't. I won't." He hugged her back fiercely and she returned it in kind.

"So," she said, after their bone breaking squeezes had ended, "The fuzzies started out being mostly in places you rarely go, like your parents' room."

"Or at the edge of my sight, like outside," he supplied.

"And somehow that allowed me to climb on the roofs of houses, but if I fell on the wrong side of a fence, I almost always ended up on your doorstep. Is that normal for your memories?"

"I don't know. I've never wandered around in my head as you have." In a way it was a good thing she'd been stuck in this lone memory, and not experienced many of his more troublesome memories, like when he'd saved a girl from a burning building without getting burned himself, his time with Adam, or any memory involving Jessi and him kissing – and blowing out light bulbs in the process. "You know, Amanda, I have a lot more secrets I should share with you."

She dismissed him. "They won't matter if we don't get out." She took a deep breath. "Let's assume that your memories always have boundaries, places that you simply don't know or can't go because you've never been there. Therefore you never recorded it with your eyes and ears."

His eyes were an obvious input for his holographic memory, and he definitely could see his ears playing a big part too, especially since his hearing was enhanced. He clearly remembered revisiting one of Jessi's most traumatic memories the night her mother had been murdered – genetic mother, anyway. Yes, ears definitely played a part of the memory recording process. "You've been thinking a lot." She huffed instead of actually replying. "Keep going," he said.

"Outside, where the memory is actively taking place, that's where the fewest fuzzies were." He nodded and she continued, "My house was almost completely full of them, but why? You've been in the living room before."

He concurred, "I've watched you play piano many times." He didn't bother with the exact number.

"So we should have been able to go into my living room, but the fuzzies were already there."

"And that brings us back to what they might be." He pondered deeply. Her reasoning was sound; he thought he knew himself, his mind. So, what might it be hiding?

She growled again, "Ah, I wish we could go back outside!"

He had an idea. "It's almost like they're trying to get near you, or maybe watch you."

"Like some sick pervert?" She laughed frantically. "Hey!" she shouted. "What if the fuzzies are like lenses trying to record information for your memory?"

"And they congregated here because they wanted to?" But then he realized where she was going with her thought.

She beat him to it, but only because she'd already started voicing it, "They were watching me because that kiss was pretty intense for us." She paused, "But when we were here they decided we were the better show."

"Because we were naked?" he asked.

"Because of the intensity of our feelings!" she said. "We might not have been having sex, but we may as well have! What if they're tired of watching that same memory as I am, and are now making their own?"

He frowned, incredulous. "But you're talking about me, my brain."

"Yes Kyle." For the first time she pulled away to look him in the eye. "You're sweet, you're innocent. I admit I am too, but you sometimes make me feel not dirty, but less innocent."

It was his turn to make a simple "Ok," into a long sound.

"I dated Charlie for two years and we used to make out," she said, stalling, and probably deliberating whether she should even continue. "Sometimes I didn't have my shirt on." Her gaze could no longer meet his eyes. "Or my bra." She resolutely focused on his eyes once more. "I never had sex with him, even though he tried to pressure me. I thought he was a gentleman just for waiting, but now I know what a true gentleman is like."

She kissed him before her last word was even out of her mouth. Although they were already tightly pressed together, she somehow managed to get even closer. His mind was reeling, his thoughts scattering every which way. Their tongues mingled in his mouth and then in hers interchangeably for an indeterminate amount of time. Because this was more their brains making out then their bodies, they didn't really need to come up for air. It also made time cease to matter altogether.

She finally reached his back side and caressed him with a few fingers, tracing leisurely doodles with a nail. He felt her hips with his free hand, letting it wander of its own accord, but always letting her dictate the pace. Maybe it wasn't the right time to do this, maybe the fuzzies would overwhelm them, but since there was nothing but the tub and them left in this memory – and they were completely naked besides – he couldn't resist her.

If that was the way she wanted to go, he'd go with her.

After an unknown amount of time, she eventually sat on his lap. Even though they weren't physically here in his memory, she was completely flushed. She ended the latest kiss in a near endless series. "Thank you Kyle for always being a gentleman, I love you."

He had difficulty saying the words but it was only because his body had gone well beyond tingling or thrumming. "I love you too Amanda."

And then she sat up straight, and he didn't feel the need to stare at her chest because they'd done so much already, even though he also knew there was plenty more they could have done. She looked about, and starting yelling, "Okay, you've had your show. You know as well as Kyle does that I'm waiting until marriage for actual sex, even here." She looked briefly into his eyes, and smiled. "If you let us go, and let us get married sometime in the future, and let us refine our technique for a few months, you'll have my permission to record another session."

Unable to believe what she was saying, his jaw dropped. He guessed it didn't really hurt to say these things if she was right, but it would be downright embarrassing if she were wrong.

She exclaimed even louder, "But! It will be wholesome and not some perverted debacle! It will be loving and tender, and no fuzzies can go between us either!" She let out a big breath and softened her voice. "If that's agreeable, let us go now."

Seconds ticked by in silence. After several minutes, she whispered to him, "Clothes please, both of us." When that was accomplished, she sat in the other side of the tub.

More minutes passed and he saw her smile fading. He couldn't stand seeing her hopes dashed. He yelled into the mist, making them swirl slightly, the first movement he'd yet seen from the fog. It probably meant it had gotten closer to them. "You have half an hour to decide, memory time!" Turning his gaze back to her, "It's worth a try."

She looked down to her hands, and picked at a nail. "I'm a bit embarrassed now."

"Don't be. It was the best idea we've had. There's not a whole lot more we can do without letting me leave you, and I'm not willing to do that."

"Even if I told you to, I know."

They held hands and gazed lovingly into each other's eyes. Minutes flowed by without effort. They were no longer flushed, and were fully at ease.

"Marriage?" he asked.

"I would love to," she replied with a big smile.

"Even with this and all my other secrets?"

She laughed out loud. "You promised to tell me your secrets already. I'm keeping you to it."

He grinned broadly, and said, "I'll happily tell you everything Amanda. No more secrets."

She raised her hand. "Only when we get out."

"Ok."

More minutes passed and they idly chatted about random things, like their earliest memories. There was a stark contrast between his and hers for example, mainly because he'd been sixteen and she remembered stray things from when she'd been four. He'd never before told anyone of the snake he'd encountered in the forest when he was first born, for example.

She was talking about her mother and father when he put a hand to her lips and yelled, "One minute left!" He was determined that if she was not released from his memory, he'd – he expelled a breath – do something drastic.

The fog swirled a little more, and was now clearly mere inches from the lip of the tub.  
The seconds ticked by in his head, clear as day. Once they numbered 30, he moved closer to her, and she mimicked him by scooting into his arms.

By the time 45 seconds had ticked by, she whispered, with all her heart, "I love you."

By 50 he said the same to her. "With all my heart," he added.

"And my soul," she said.

"My soul mate," he finished, and he clearly heard the 59th tick of the clock.


	7. Chapter 7

The sixtieth second ticked by, and the sixty-first, and on and on. Despite holding on to Amanda, Kyle couldn't contain a growl very low in his throat.

Amanda squeezed him harder then said, "The deadline's past?" He smoothed her hair, and couldn't contain two tears that escaped his eyes. Whether she noticed, she didn't say. They sat there, in the middle of the encroaching sea of fog, of blasted fuzzies. He so wanted to swear but it just wasn't in him, mainly because it wouldn't accomplish anything.

It would be another three minutes and seventeen seconds before Amanda released her grip on him, even though he continued to cling to her. He put his face into her neck, ashamed of his powerlessness. He didn't know where in his memory this was, so he did not dare leave for even a millisecond because he didn't know if he could return.

There was no way he was leaving without her, none whatsoever. This was the girl who wanted to marry him, who, despite being normally conceived and having average intellect, was not at all daunted by his superior brain, or his abilities, or even the danger of simply being with him. She'd already seen him levitate over water and conduct electricity and she likely suspected he could hear better than a dog. Speaking of which, she'd once seen the normally rangy mutt across the street barking wildly at him – when he barely understood anything at all actually – and then suddenly behave very tamely. Okay, he admitted reluctantly that the dog was far from mangy but it was normally ill tempered.

It was not that he could speak to animals, but that he could control the pheromones that normally set them off as well as those who identified him as a friend or more specifically their master.

She dispersed his wandering thoughts with a soft whisper into his ear. When he withdrew, she frowned, ruefully he believed. He saw nothing but poise and strength in her gaze; she had not given up. She said, putting her hands on his cheeks for a change, "Kyle, that's why we're going to bring the fight to them. There's lots of things we can do, like standing up, and if we disappear somewhere, we both keep doing it until we find each other again."

Fresh tears threatened his frail composure. "Amanda, I can't lose you."

"For as long as you live, I'll always be in you." Her words shattered his restraint on his tears, and yet gave him strength of will at the same time. She continued after a mirthless chuckle, "You'll always find me in your heart, not just your head." She paused, squeezing his hands as they both spotted some fuzzies threatening to spill over into the tub. "I'm going to stand now, are you coming?"

He made every effort to touch the fuzzies at the exact same moment as she did, in an effort to keep from getting separated. They were very surprised when they stood in the tub, unaffected by them.

"This is fog?" muttered Amanda, completely bewildered. He was just as dumbfounded. More had just started to spill into the tub and began to swirl around their feet and obscure the bottom of the tub ever so slightly. "These aren't fuzzies," she said as she scowled into the mist. She took his hand in a firm grip and stepped out of the tub into the thigh high fog and hit floor. "I think we might still be in your room."

"I've never had fog in my room."

"Come on," she said, pulling his arm gently. Not seeing a reason to do otherwise, he held her hand firmly and followed. They walked several feet, then a dozen feet. They never saw anything but fog, and there were no obstacles, like walls or a desk. "Okay," she said, stretching the word over a few seconds. "We're not in your room." She looked back the way they'd come and he did the same. There was no sign of the tub.

They stopped walking and looked all around. "It's totally featureless," he said. He crouched and touched the floor. It looked like his bedroom's floor but definitely wasn't.

Amanda interrupted his examination with a little gasp, causing him to jump to his feet. Excitedly she said, "How many seconds have passed since the deadline?"

Without hesitation he answered her, which instantly made him notice the same thing she'd just discovered. Earlier he had had no clear grasp of time when he was inside the rogue memory.

"I'm not stuck in the memory anymore," she ventured and gave him a big hug.

"And we're not in any memory now," he supplied, feeling much better. In fact, the fuzzies had probably left when Amanda had announced the end of their _show_. It was embarrassing they'd even had to do that to appease them.

"Take us out, Kyle!" she shouted, hugging him even more tightly. He nodded and closed his eyes for the briefest moment.

***

When she saw Kyle close his eyes, a small part of her had expected him to vanish and leave her alone in the sea of fog, in a memory that had never happened. It was however a very small part of her, a part she'd almost completely squashed in the last six or eight months in his head. To think she'd made peace with the prospect of living years of her life in there, even if they were mental years and not physical ones.

She knew Kyle was special, had known it ever since he'd casually walked off the roof of his family's house and caused her to crash her car when she saw him land effortlessly, like a cat. She knew his head held secrets, secrets he might not even know he held. His few superpowers as she liked to call them – which included being able to relive his memories in perfect detail – had the potential to be developed and put to much better use.

She was a very different person now after living a single memory for just under a year. She was ready to put his talents to use; she wasn't going to be the lame love interest of the common superhero, the one who couldn't decide whether she wanted the adventure and the inherent danger or to deny her part in keeping him motivated and growing in power, ahead of his villains.

Love flowed deeply in her heart for this man. There was no doubt in her mind that she would fight her mother to marry him, fight anyone. Before this ordeal she would have given up on Kyle if another girl moved in on him, but now she was determined. He had darkness within him that had to be held in check, forever. The fuzzies were only a small part of that darkness. There was no doubt he'd be a fantastic assassin for example, but that would squander his true potential.

She might not be the only person who could keep his innocence and his sweetness untainted – she thought Jessi might be able to as well, only because she was just like him, despite outward appearances – but if they were both sufficiently abused and manipulated by people, by the underbelly of society, they could cause a lot more harm than good.

Was it wrong that she wanted happiness and to reap the harvest while averting potential disaster? She'd prayed and meditated on it for weeks and didn't believe so. She probably would never admit much of this to Kyle until years from now, if ever. With their brains alone, both Kyle and Jessi could change the world, transform it like no other before them. Her hands balled into fists as she opened her eyes.

She'd already smelled the air around her and had known he'd succeeded in getting her out. The absence of so many things, smells, tastes, even touch, made her relish what she had.

It didn't trouble her one bit that Jessi and Kyle were hugging. She said, "May I," and happily squeezed in beside them, and squeezed them both. There was no surprise when Jessi hesitated slightly, but she squeezed her a little more for reassurance. They'd be good friends from now on, regardless of their past.

Others rushed in, in fact the whole family, and Foss, whom Kyle had never adequately described his role. He was much too distant and professional – too intense – to be simply a friend. She likened him more to a warrior.

While the trio hugged, she realized that the whole family had known everything. Well, not everything, on second thought. They certainly knew of his abilities and his past, and Jessi's too, but that didn't even irk her now. She welcomed their presence.

It had been a while since she'd seen anyone after all.

When the trio separated and some of the more urgent questions had been answered, like the obvious "What the hell happened," and the all important, "What time is it," she learned that her mother had come looking for her to go to church over three hours ago. She had been in his head for just over seven hours. She and Kyle had been found crumpled on the floor, seemingly holding hands in rigor mortis, and yet still warm and very much alive.

The IV equipment in the corner did not escape her notice. This Foss was terribly resourceful. She wouldn't have been surprised to have had a catheter and be lying in a hospital bed, still attached to Kyle from the look in his eyes.

Jessi had been randomly scouring Kyle's memories for any trace of them for hours until she was suddenly booted out when she'd decided to start from last night's dinner. Jessi could get through much of dinner, but the memory would always freeze just before she and Kyle would leave for her house. Jessi had been trying to access the rogue memory since then with as much luck as he'd had in getting her out.

Josh reentered the bedroom with two bowls of fruit and some toast on a small platter. "Are you hungry?" Maybe it was the reason why they hadn't realized the fuzzies had let them go, because they were both very hungry, and thirsty. Her brain had likely begun to tire from lack of nutrition. After she took a bite of toast and the platter had been removed from Josh's hands, she gave him a strong hug too. "Thanks Josh!"

She polished off the food and the drinks that were later brought in; they both received seconds.

When everything started to calm down and family members and Foss dispersed, Amanda stopped Jessi with a hand on her arm. Kyle went with the others. "We should be friends Jessi." She and Kyle had made no mention that she'd experienced nearly a year's time in his head. They'd been worried enough in thinking she was there for seven hours.

It was true Kyle had been about to spill the beans about everything, but she had stopped him with a simple look. It wasn't lying, because they were going to tell them everything eventually. It wouldn't even be a long time; they would tell them things in manageable chunks, so as to not distress anyone unnecessarily.

Jessi was a different matter.

Her brow furrowed and she almost instantly answered with a rather blunt, "Why?"

That might have once made Amanda mad, but it now only made her laugh out loud. Jessi had so much to learn, Kyle too for that matter. She wasn't so deluded to think she'd have all the answers all the time – in fact she expected them to provide them most of the time – but together the three of them could probably tackle anything.

Jessi seemed perplexed, and was eyeing her curiously, surely listening to her heart or checking her blood pressure or something. "Because you're exactly like Kyle and you need someone you can tell anything." Jessi's eyes opened wide and she continued, "Absolutely anything."

"What did you see?" She seemed pretty nervous; they probably had made out after she had broken up with Kyle and that was completely understandable as teenagers. She'd been there too. Kyle was very easy to love and few guys if any could ever compare, as long as the darkness stayed dormant.

She knew Jessi would understand better than any of the others. "He fell asleep last night fantasizing, reliving a short memory of our first french kiss."

"After dinner?"

She might once have been shy about such details but she was a drastically changed person. She nodded, and said, "I was stuck in that memory for almost a year, watched it I don't know how many times, and nothing he did could get us out." Jessi's demeanor darkened considerably, and her hands were opening and closing, probably somewhat involuntarily. To her credit she didn't ask why they had not told everyone else. Instead she stayed silent so she could continue, "I'm telling you so you don't make the same mistake in the future, when you experience something so special or intense that you feel you have to revisit it again."

Jessi nodded, extremely serious. She'd probably secretly scold Kyle for doing something so juvenile, but then guys were prone to doing insensible things with their high testosterone levels. "Remember it, cherish it, but don't relive it," was her advice.

Jessi eyed her suspiciously again but nodded. Amanda thanked her and gave her another hug, which Jessi only semi-allowed. "It's great to see you by the way, pod girl." And with those words, she left Jessi rooted to the spot and went straight home, but also glanced up the stairs because it was one of the few places she'd not been able to go.

When she stepped outside and felt the wind on her face, with the smell of grass and flowers, and the sounds of cars and kids and dogs, yes even barking dogs, it was almost too much for her to take. Tears surfaced and she couldn't keep them back. It was so nice to feel so much again. The door opened behind her, and she expected Kyle to be there and support her on her way to her house.

She'd probably be grounded for a while; that was perfectly fine with her.

But when she saw Jessi's arms around her she was really warmed by the gesture. Her throat constricted – another unfamiliar physical feeling – and she choked out words of thanks. With Jessi's help she recovered after a few minutes and they walked together to her front door.

Before opening the door, she turned back to Jessi, and saw Kyle only a few steps behind her. It surprised her that she hadn't heard him, but really, should it have? "Thank you Jessi, I really needed it. Kyle, I'll see you when I'm no longer grounded." She turned around and almost opened the door when she thought of something to add, "Kyle, I told Jessi most of it. Tell her the rest okay, everything."

His brow innocently furrowed and he swallowed. "Okay." Jessi looked from one to the other, clearly curious and with a bit of anger toward Kyle, but also concern.

When she walked into her house, she started to cry again when she saw her piano. Without removing her shoes she sat and played the melody she had practiced in her head whenever she'd been close to despair while inside Kyle's head. It was one of the things that had helped her get through the ordeal, the immense solitude.

She knew well that her mother would come down when she heard the first notes. It was funny how fast her mom was racing down the stairs too, but she wouldn't smile or laugh. This was serious after all, and definitely not a game.

"Amanda," her mom called loudly in the way she normally reserved for when she was in deep trouble. Normally she would have stopped playing, but it was one of few songs she remembered by heart at present, and just wanted – no, needed – to hear it to its conclusion.

After several seconds of unusual silence from her, her mother walked up beside her, and carefully put a hand on her shoulder. "You haven't played that song in ages." Her mother had always loved it when she played the piano, and it was true she played pretty well, used to anyway.

From the corner of her eye she could see her mother worry and wring her hands. She noticed her staring at her hands on the keys, one hand specifically. "You're not telling me…"

Carol Bloom, the fiery lady who almost always commanded control, who once even locked her inside the house when she was grounded previously – again, because of Kyle – couldn't finish the simple sentence because of the fear it caused her.

But then she didn't understand; she couldn't. Amanda allowed a small smile to appear on her face when she completed her mother's sentence, "Yes mom, I'm getting married to Kyle."

"When," her mother erupted. "Are you pregnant," she asked even more venomously.

As the last notes to the popular wedding song finished, the only song she completely remembered beginning to end, she turned to her mother. She refused to play Shouting Match, a popular mother daughter game that always ended with mother winning, at least in this house. Instead, she said, "After we graduate high school, and no I'm still a virgin, thanks."

She had a long battle ahead of her, but she would win this one, no matter what.

The world might very well depend on it.

***

FIN

Author's Note: I expect a sequel story to this, set further in the future and it will likely start at the wedding or maybe just a memory of it. Not yet sure what the title will be but it will be written mostly from Amanda's point of view, as mastermind of the Kyle-Jessi work team, while Kyle-Amanda are happily married and Amanda-Jessi are very good friends, confidantes even. That's probably so AU many here might not even read it! Oh well, I'll still write it!

Let me know please if you enjoyed the Twilight Zone-like storyline. And if you even like Alternate Universe entries like this one. I know two people do!

Kyle-Jessi is definitely the best work pairing there is. ;)

God bless.


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